Toilet Technology
You really need one of these. The Toto Washlet toilet seat. Who knew a toilet seat could do so much.
You really have to check out the marketing though. It's amazing that they can sell toilets seats without using any potty words. It washes and blow dries your ass for you. They don't actually say that cause, how would you say that?
Who Gives a Flying Fig what Bush Believes
"I wouldn't ask a mother or a dad -- I wouldn't put their son in harm's way if I didn't believe this was necessary for the security of the United States and the peace of the world. I strongly believe it, and I strongly believe we'll prevail. And I strongly believe that democracy will trump totalitarianism every time. That's what I believe. And those are the belief systems on which I'm making decisions that I believe will yield the peace."
-- George W. Bush, Cleveland, July 10, 2007
Who gives a flying fig for what you believe, Mr. President? You believed trading Sammy Sosa to the White Sox was a good move. You believed Saddam was making nukes from Nigerien yellowcake. You believed Senators of both parties would acclaim Harriet Miers as a "superb choice" for the Supreme Court," an American of "unwavering devotion to the Constitution and laws of our country." You said you had faith in General Casey (until you fired him). You keep telling us you have faith in Alberto Gonzales. We know you believe in a Higher Power, Mr. Bush -- hey, if AA works for you, you go, guy -- but why should any American mother or dad let you put their son in harm's way just because you "strongly believe" that his being wasted by a roadside IED in an Islamic civil war makes the world more peaceful and the United States more secure?
I can't help thinking that it's not just a rhetorical tic. In Bush's faith-based epistemology, the strongest possible justification for any action he takes is that he believes in it. Not that it's true; not that it's supported by evidence; not that it's consistent with the Constitution; not that it enforces the law; not that it's desired by the vast majority of the American people -- but that, like the Nicene Creed, he believes it.
from I Believe for Every Drop of Rain That Falls, A Flower Grows
Thailand, Here I Come
I purchased my plane ticket to Thailand today. Yea! I'm going for my friends' wedding at the end of August and then I'm going to stay and travel around for a while after the wedding, maybe take some diving lessons. I'm gonna stop over in Tokyo too for a few days on my way back, probably stay in one of those capsule hotels cause it's relatively cheap, $40/night.
I'm leaving August 20, returning September 9. If anyone wants to stay in my apartment while I'm gone let me know. I'm sure the cats would appreciate the company.
iPhone? Revolutionary is not an overstatement
So I don't know why some people were suprised, but I got an iPhone last Friday. No, I did not wait in line.
I went down to the Apple store at around 3pm on Friday and there was a line around the block. I went back at 9pm and there was no line, but there was a strange mist of post-shopping-orgy energy in the air. People looked like they needed a cigarette. The store was oddly vacant except for this localized swarm of people around the iPhone display tables. I tried jumping up and down a bit to see if I could actually see an iPhone inside the swarm of droolers but I couldn't so I just went to the counter and bought my own.
You activate the iPhone with iTunes. It was really easy. You just use your apple id and associated credit card. My activation took forever though, it didn't get activated until like 2pm on Saturday. Friday night it just said "Please activate" and all I could do was lock and unlock the keyboard, which I did many times. The animation is really detailed and nice. It was a night of torture. I woke up at 6am wondering if it had been activated yet. (It hadn't).
So having used it for a whole 2 days now, I'm still amazed. I had high expections coming from Apple and it has exceeded all of them by far. It really is revolutionary from a user interface perspective. In one weekend it has made every other PDA out there obsolete. I see people with their Treos poking away with their little stylus and they look at me with this sad look in their eye. Once you use an iPhone, you're going to have a whole lot less patience for the other interfaces out there. Even a mouse seems a little outdated to me now.
That's why I don't think "revolutionary" is an overstatement. Apple has started a whole new language we can use to talk to computers. Yea, we can get notebook computers with a touch screen, but the interface was still designed for a mouse. A touch-based interface requires a complete reworking of the basic interface concepts. Apple has done it, and in ways that are so natural and intuitive and undeniably better than anything that preceded it, that it really is going to affect everything that comes after it. It's like central air conditioning or something.
The camera takes great photos and does well in low light.
The screen clarity is amazing. It looks almost like printed paper. It's twice as clear and legible as my laptop screen. It's easier to read my mail on my phone than my computer now.
The web browser is great. No Flash support and no SVG support, but javascript seems to work well. I tried using a javascript pop-up date selection from travelocity and it worked, but was kinda hard to hit the right date with my finger. The browser has excellent touch-based controls for standard HTML form controls though. Sometimes sites with a lot of javascript can be a little slow. Connection speeds are fast when connected with WiFi but AT&T's data speeds are a little slow. Still usable, but not really at mid-conversation-googling speeds.
You can run nextbus in the browser but a widget would be really nice. Links to quicktime video files from the web browser stream and play really well.
The microphone on the headphones it came with works great. I think the sound quality of calls I've had on the headset are the best I've gotten out of any phone ever. It's weird hearing people's voice in stereo. No straining to hear anything, that's for sure. It's like they're inside your head, it's kinda weird. It sounds like your own voice sounds when you talk, except it's someone else's voice. I could see it driving some to madness. Probably doesn't mix well with LSD.
The battery seems pretty decent. Both of the last two days it's seen pretty heavy use and the battery has lasted all day. When I got home on Saturday night it was almost dead.
My only complaints so far: You can rotate the phone and get a horizontal format keyboard in the web browser, but not in the chat or mail applications. Also since a lot of video sights use Flash to show their video, Flash support in the safari app would be nice. I'm sure it'll probably come with an update.
And of course I can't wait for the video iChat version of the iPhone, but that'll be on different hardware.